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Random thoughts with sporadically profound meaning

Category Archives: freedom

Summer is a crazy time for me. The lodge is busy and I have the knack of having a multitude of side projects in the works while surviving my busy summer hospitality job. Some days feel like a smooth paddle on a calm lake and others feel like a roller coaster ride through Hell. By mid-summer, I am physically and emotionally drained and I need something to make me feel centered again.

Writing is a good place to start the process of realigning myself. Writing is cathartic. Typing words onto a screen makes the rest of the world fade slowly into the background until there is nothing left but me, my laptop and my imagination. The minutes and hours I spend writing make me happy and bring me to a level of calm that is somewhat hypnotic. There is only one other thing that can take me beyond hypnotic to being completely detached from reality and that is cooking.

It is 38 degrees today with humidity and my gut told me that it was the perfect time to make a summer corn and zucchini chowder. When my parents were still alive, the times we spent in the kitchen together were some of the happiest moments of our lives. My mom was the queen of baking sweet treats for everyone and my dad loved to cook. My brother and I inherited his passion for creating tasty dishes and homemade soups. My dad was never one to use a recipe, unless he was making Martha Stewart’s Shortbread, and his food was almost always delicious…..I will save the story of his scrambled eggs made with eggnog for another day.

To me, there is no greater satisfaction than creating something from a bunch of random ingredients. Individually those ingredients can taste good, but when you combine them in a way they compliment the flavor of the others, that is sheer bliss. The bacon is fried, the onions are rendering in the bacon fat and the rest of the ingredients are ready to be thrown in. The result will be a tasty summer chowder that would make my dad proud.

At the end of the cooking process, I will sit down to a comforting bowl of soup for dinner and feel thoroughly decompressed. My mind will be back in its happy place and I will relish the memories of my mother calling us for each and every dinner, regardless of the menu, by saying, “soup’s on”.

“NO” is the most common word to ever come out of a child’s mouth. It’s an instinctual response to any question or suggestion for anyone under the age of three and that response is never second-guessed. So why now, when we have the ability to reason and make an informed decision, based on what is best for us, do we find it so hard to utter that simple word and mean it?

“No” is a complete sentence. It does not require any justification, nor does it need an explanation. It is a succinct and pithy response that needs no further words to make its meaning understood.

For us to procure as much happiness as we can from each day we are afforded in this lifetime, we must learn to make our decisions by putting our happiness first. We must set boundaries for ourselves and embrace and listen to the most important voice we will ever hear – our own. It’s human instinct to want to please other people by saying yes, but how much of ourselves are we giving up by agreeing so quickly and not allowing that inner voice to offer its opinion.

If the answer in your heart is ‘no’, find a gentle way of not accepting the offer or challenge and let that three-year old voice in your head speak for both of you. That voice is giving you some sage advice. You should take it.

A couple years ago, I was in the same mindset and wrote this post and here I am again. Like most people who struggle with their weight, I have good moments and bad moments. Working in hospitality gives me even more of a challenge having to be around food all day, every day. And the icing on the cake (yes, I had to use a food reference) is that we just hired a new chef at the lodge and have been tasting all of his wonderful creations.

It has not escaped my attention that my body is not as willing or able to break down many of these treats complimented by cream sauces and bacon. Many years ago, I followed a very regimented plan where the only processed foods I ate were the meals I processed myself. I knew exactly what I was putting into my mouth and I could pronounce every single ingredient.

I have been slowly getting back into the way I used to eat. Every week, I make five or six salads in a mason jar for my lunches. It is a quick process to prepare lunch for the week and even easier to grab a jar and know I am having a very healthy lunch. I am going to make my own granola tonight for my breakfasts and my body will react well to the fact there are no preservatives that it has to figure out how to break down. I don’t need any more random ingredients stored in fat cells because my digestive system can’t come to the proper conclusion on how to dispose of the mysterious ingredients.

Weight and Girth (thank you Saturday Night Live) have been jamming in the basement of my viscera for far too long and the eviction notice is waiting to be served. Today I had my last Peameal Bacon on a bun from my Aunt and Uncle’s restaurant, at least for a few months. My fridge will be stocked with fruit and vegetables, whole foods and water.

It’s time to start the party in another room in my body and let Weight and Girth take up space in someone else’s basement. And by sharing this with everyone who reads this blog, I am making myself accountable to kick those two out on the street. Party on Weight, Party on Girth…..just not in my world anymore. Schwing!

The lawn needs to be mowed, I have half a story left to finish for the project I am helping my local library with but this morning I am making time for myself. I have just finished a long 14-day stretch at work without a day off and put in sixty-seven hours last week. It’s time for me.

Those chores will be done later today but this morning I am doing something I haven’t given myself time to do for the last four years – I’m going golfing. I’m leaving my responsibilities behind and letting myself enjoy the morning with a very dear friend. Life is too short to sweat the small stuff and having a cleanly mowed lawn is infinitesimal in the grand scheme of my happiness today.

Today is not about having time, it is about making time. Too many moments have passed me by because I put something or someone else first. Today is about me being selfish and I’m okay with that. I’m going to get dressed in my new golf shirt, shine my clubs and chase a little white ball around a freshly manicured lawn that would put mine to shame. I can only hope I remember how to hit the damn thing. Fore!

Time has a wonderful way of changing our perception of certain points in our lives. I ran into a person yesterday and just the slight glimpse of that person reminded me of a decision that was basically made for me many years ago, but it was a decision I should have been wise enough to make myself.

I was a participant in a friendship I knew was toxic. So many of the things this friend did should have been glaring beacons that the road we were headed down was hazardous. We had navigated the small bumps along the way but, when the test car picked up speed towards the wall, I should have hit the brakes. Instead, the car ricocheted along the track towards its inevitable end. Thankfully, this third-party I saw yesterday unknowingly shoved me out of the car just before it hit the wall. Although this gesture was not made with any concern for me, it nonetheless saved me from years of invisible pain.

Somewhere during our friendship, I had taken a back seat. I had ignored my inner voices and let the reckless driving continue while I did nothing to stop it. When I did finally speak up, the third-party had accused me of being unfair and told me my actions were very disappointing. The only thing that was disappointing was the fact that I had not spoken up sooner. Narcissism aside, some of the things I bore witness to could be a plot in a soap opera. The lies were just the beginning. There were threats, blackmail, an exchange of money and flagrant manipulation. It was incomprehensible.

The fact that my friend seemed unconcerned about the atrocious behavior and the third-party seemed to condone it through their ignorance and unwillingness to hear the truth was enough to make me appreciate the fact that they pushed me out of that relationship. The betrayal had caused enough of a divide in our friendship that I was able to stand on one side of the chasm that divided our relationship and truly see what was on the other side.

Every so often, circumstances make me look backwards into that void. Life has marched on for the three of us, some lives have been looked upon more favorably than others, but we all still bear our own scars of that crash test car.

March 8th had never previously had a profound effect on my life. It had always been a day like any other. But four years ago, that day marked the separation between the calendar date that my mother and my father passed away. Although the losses were separated by almost 8 years, the fact did not go unrecognized that the dates of their individual passing almost overlapped. March 7th was the fourth anniversary of my mom’s passing and March 9th will be the twelfth anniversary of losing my dad.

Time is a funny thing. Had those moments not occurred within less than 48 hours of each other, eight years later, that single day on the calendar would go by inconspicuously. It would still be a day like any other.

But today has become a bridge – a connection that holds the memories of both my mom and my dad in a splendid moment of happiness between the two saddest days of our lives.

Today is the day when their laughter is heard and the thoughts of their smiles are etched in our memories. Those moments shine above the heartbreak of their losses. Today is the day that will hold us in its embrace, allowing us to live in the contentment of how wonderful life was when they were both still with us. And today is the day that we can stand on top of that bridge and not feel the pain of loss on either side.

Writing is a portal into the deepest reaches of our imagination. There are no rules, apart from grammar and sentence structure, so a writer is free to craft a story about anything that tickles our fancy.

I really began my writing journey when I was eleven years old. I loved the fact that words could take me to far away places, places that I had created, and that I could get lost in those words for hours. It didn’t matter, back then, if the story was silly. All that mattered is that I was transported into another world by words, captivated by ideas and compelled to chase the feeling of elation I got by writing a story or a poem.

I still get that same feeling of euphoria when I write. Some days the words don’t flow as easily, but on the days that they do my fingers can’t type the words fast enough. I love to look back at the beginning of this blog to see just how much the voice of my writing has changed. I didn’t know that the stages of writing included puberty but I certainly found that stage and my writing voice changed to become the one I have now, the voice that wrote my book.

I am hopeful that becoming a published author is something that is written in the stars, for me, and not written in the sand. But if the writing Gods have scribbled my name on the beach, only to see it washed away by the tide, I will always have my words.